Gathering Cecil County News Via RSS Feeds

On the sidebar of Someone Noticed, readers will find syndication (RSS) links to more Cecil County news sources. These automatic links are instantly updated when someone posts a local pieces. One cluster of feeds we are monitoring are an entire array of citizen journalism blogs, which have been created in the county in recent times. By-the-way, citizen journalism refers to news reporting done by the public, rather than trained journalists.

News aggregators are another enhancement for monitoring local news. Sites such as Topix and Google News monitor over 10,000 online news sources and they grab local news items based on keyword searches. On a site such as Topix, visitors are able to access local Cecil County news, which is feed by traditional media streams These sources include radio and television broadcasters, newspapers, online publishers, blogs, and magazines.

Someone Noticed is able to grab the RSS feeds (a method for capturing the headlines from each site) and have them appear nearly instantly on this blog. Thus site visitors are able to scan the headlines and read material from WBOC, the Salisbury TV Station, the Baltimore Sun, the Cecil Whig, the News Journal, the Daily Times, WBAL Radio, or whatever traditional sources prints carries a Cecil County piece. No one would have the time to scan the thousands of potential sites that might carry a local story, but the automation takes care of that, providing news feeds of interest.

Topix, one of the company’s monitoring over 10,000 online news sources and posting over 300,000 stories each day, says that it sees “a big hunger for local news.” We agree and we think you’ll find this RSS feeds to be a helpful way to keep informed about local happenings in the county. So each time you surf over scan the feeds in the sidebar to see what’s new.

Purpose

Originally concentrating on saving some Public Open Space Elkton proposed selling to a developer, we expanded the blog's focus once the Mayor and Commissioners abandoned the attempt. During the nearly year-long process, Someone Noticed found that many important subjects at town meetings weren’t being covered by the media and we also established a regular readership. In consideration of all these elements, we are now focusing more broadly on the “411 on the Mayor and Commissioners of the Town of Elkton” and subjects of broad civic interest to the Greater Elkton Community, especially when it isn't covered by other media. (see about section for more details.)